Schools' transport costs go through the roof

Apr 17 2008 By John Rowbotham

ALMOST £4.5 million has so far been spent on transport for pupils displaced by the schools modernisation programme.

The information was revealed to the Advertiser following a Freedom of Information request to South Lanarkshire Council.

The data also shows that the programme has provided a boost for bus companies.

One firm has already earned more than £600,000 from contracts to transport children and staff decanted to other schools.

Under the programme to modernise South Lanarkshire’s 21 secondaries, 19 schools will be replaced and two refurbished at a total cost of £374m.

In addition, all 124 of the area’s primaries are being either replaced or upgraded at a cost of £850m.

Work began in August 2003, with the building of a new school for pupils of St Bride’s, Bothwell.

Both the primary and secondary schools programmes are due for completion by 2016.

A number of primaries and secondaries have had to be decanted to other campuses to allow their schools to be knocked down and rebuilt on the same site, or refurbished.

As a result, primaries such as St Bride’s were transported each school day for more than a year to empty classrooms at St Peter’s, Hamilton, for their lessons.

According to the information supplied by the council, the total cost of transporting the St Bride’s youngsters totalled £139,863.

Transport costs arising from decanting pupils of St Elizabeth’s Primary, Hamilton, to St Peter’s, amounted to £207,744.

It cost £139,878 to transport pupils of St Cuthbert’s Primary, Hamilton, to St Peter’s over a 14-month period.

The figures also show that the failure to complete Blantyre’s Calderside Academy on time led to an additional £201,600 in transport costs.

That money was spent between August 16, 2007, and December 21 of that year on coaches to transport some Earnock High pupils to Blantyre High, and some Blantyre High pupils to Earnock.

Total cost of completed decant contracts is £2,568,679.

Current contracts for decant transport will cost £1,865,715, and includes the two-year £690,658 bill for conveying Strathaven Academy’s 800 pupils to East Kilbride.

Another current contract, again for two years, is the transport of 1000 pupils from Trinity High, Rutherglen, to the former Holy Cross High, Hamilton, at a cost of £794,341.

The total bill for decant transport so far stands at £4,434,394.